Springs, Rivers and Oceans

The Jordan River and the Sea of Galilee.

A great river of fresh water empties into the salty ocean. What is it that keeps the mouth of river fresh and uncontaminated by the salt water? The river has a source of fresh water that is separate from the ocean and the river maintains a steady flow going outward. As Christians, we can think of the ocean as the world and ourselves as the river and understand that when we feel a strong current of carnality, it is because of the affections of our heart. Our heart is the source of our river and our affections are the springs of our river. When you examine yourself, don't just look on the outward but, look closely at the springs of your heart. Are they flowing out to the world or are they receiving from the world its counterfeit satisfactions? Is our heart set in such a way that our (spiritual) source is preferred and chosen to be our only ONLY source and we are careful to keep it far away from the counterfeit, which is low, temporary, vain, dim and unable to impart any life. By the way, your careful watching and jealous guarding of your soul's only source of life is the very definition of holiness. Holiness is simple and yet vital for without it no one will see God (Heb 12:14). When you look to God and think what he offers is the rarest and the most valuable, you have fulfilled every obligation. There is no more that your heart can do.

So, follow the advise of King Solomon, the Apostle Paul and Jesus:

Pro 4:23 Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life.
Mat 6:21  for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Col 3:2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.
Rom 8:6  For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace,

Now, once your affections are set on the things above, you have to act like you are pursuing life and peace above all else. First believe and then do and Jesus says you will have fulfilled ALL that is in the law and the prophets.

Mat 22:37-40  And He said to him, " 'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.'  38  "This is the great and foremost commandment.  39  "The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.'  40  "On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets."

Gal 5:14  For the whole Law is fulfilled in one word, in the statement, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF."

Keeping a fresh source to your river. (Pro 4:23, Mat 6:21, Col 3:2 and Rom 8:6)

Maintaining the outflow. (Matt 22:40 and Gal 5:14)

Monergism / Synergism 2 , The Heart

God is omnipotent. There is nothing too difficult for Him. So that means He can do anything, right? Well, yes that would be true if power was the only consideration in God's choosing to do something. But, it is not. Along with power, God is equally wise and good, making somethings impossible for him to do or others impossible not to do. God cannot bless wickedness and He will always draw near to the humble. So with that said I want to look at a scripture that is usually put forward to support the concept of Monergism. Again, Monergism is the view that there is only one agent, i.e. God, at work in the heart of a person when they decide to believe the gospel. If it can be shown that man is incapable of making a good choice, with or without support from God, then Synergism is left untenable.

Jer 17:9 NASB  "The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?

Without context this scripture can be folded together with a pretext of man being unable to make any spiritual choices. Remember, if you are going to say that man is only able to make wicked choices, then you cannot say he is dead like a corpse and unable to respond, because a bad choice is still a choice. And if you if you think only wickedness can come out the heart of man then you need to explain why we are not all atheists, murderers and rapists. It is said that the doctrine of Total Depravity does not mean we are as completely depraved as we could be. But again, why not? The reason is man has a will and is able to make moral choices. Verse 9 serves as the fulcrum for two opposing and ultimate truths. 

Man is in a sinful condition ---v--- God requires man to do right.

Jer 17:5-11

5 Thus says the LORD, "Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind And makes flesh his strength, And whose heart turns away from the LORD.

6 "For he will be like a bush in the desert And will not see when prosperity comes, But will live in stony wastes in the wilderness, A land of salt without inhabitant.

7 "Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD And whose trust is the LORD.

8 "For he will be like a tree planted by the water, That extends its roots by a stream And will not fear when the heat comes; But its eaves will be green, And it will not be anxious in a year of drought Nor cease to yield fruit.

9 "The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?

10 "I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, Even to give to each man according to his ways, According to the results of his deeds.

11 "As a partridge that hatches eggs which it has not laid, So is he who makes a fortune, but unjustly; In the midst of his days it will forsake him, And in the end he will be a fool."

Cursed is the man ---^--- Blessed is the Man

Whose heart turns away from the Lord ---^--- Who trusts in the Lord

The '^' is the HEART or the will of man, the seat of all decision making. It is our heart that chooses blessing or a curse. Our heart is the fulcrum or the pivot point. 

But, our heart is deceitful, twisted, polluted, frail, wicked, incurably sick. (see Strong's definitions for deceitful and sick) Who knows how to change it? GOOD News! God does. The Lord searches the heart. 

However, it seems like verse 10 ends with a hopeless truth that God will reward each man according to the results of his deeds, actions, choices. So, there it is we are going to be rewarded according to the choices made by a polluted and desperately sick heart. We are doomed. And we would be doomed if God was not good and willing to forgive sin.

Jer 17:14 NASB  Heal me, O LORD, and I will be healed; Save me and I will be saved, For You are my praise.

If we acknowledge our condition as sinners and that our heart is sick, and cast ourselves on God our maker to forgive us and cleanse us, we will be healed and we will be saved. There is nothing we can do with this polluted heart that will allow God to accept us. God can only regard faith and faith alone by itself. Faith is the opposite of trusting in flesh like the cursed man in verse 5.

Psa 32:1-2 NASB
1  How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered!
2  How blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no deceit!

Psa 32:5 NASB  I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I did not hide; I said, "I will confess my transgressions to the LORD"; And You forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah.

Man has the choice to be blessed or cursed. Man's condition is sinful, but our God is good and He will bless the one who trusts in Him.

In case you are wondering, I realize these verses where spoken under the old covenant and no amount of trusting and repenting by itself will qualify one for eternal salvation and to be a joint-heir with God. I will address this question in another post. But you, if you disagree with me, you have a question of your own to answer. How is it that unregenerate people in the old covenant were blessed and healed and were called righteous? How could they be blessed and righteous when Leviticus 18:5 says cursed is everyone who does not keep every part of the Law? 

Monergism / Synergism Introduction

Christians have no problem finding doctrines to debate and most of them eventually arrive at and march around the question of Monergism or Synergism. Has God determined every event, good and evil, or has he chosen to allow other agents to have an effect on events? Not an effect on the ultimate outcome, but an effect on the individual events within the outcome. In other words, can God determine that Jesus Christ is going to have an eternal bride, i.e. a body of believers, and yet allow individual believers the free will to choose to enter or not enter the kingdom of Heaven.

Yes, it seems to me that sum total of scripture points to a synergistic explanation of God's interactions with mankind. As a young Christian I read passages of the bible that supported both points of view. Some verses spoke of predestination. And it made sense that God as the creator would have to know all future events and therefore must have decided these events are what He wanted to come to pass. He is the one who lifts up and He is the one who puts down. What He opens and no man can shut and what He closes no man can open. And to this day, I believe this is all true. On the other hand I read scriptures that said to "choose this day whom you will serve" or "whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." This too makes good sense. One day there will be a final judgment day and God will judge every man according to what he has done. And so I reasonably understand that God considers every man to be responsible for his own actions. So there we have it: God predestines the future according to His will and we are accountable to Him.

So when people ask me "do you believe in predestination or free will?" I answer, "Yes!" It is okay to not know how God does what He does. This kind of mystery is completely acceptable. All mysteries are solved by putting in place the pieces of knowledge that we know to be true and working in from there. I know that the stream of God's activities, seen and unseen, flow down the valley between the mountains of God's decrees and Man's choices. God does hold man accountable for the free will he has been given while at the same time it is absolutely true that there is nothing outside of God's sovereign control. I don't always need to know exactly where the stream is turning at any given point in time. If I remember where the mountains are I will always know where to find the stream of God's faithful dealings. It is always at the intersection of God's promise and God's command. Obey Him until you run into His promise.

If you find yourself disagreeing with my position of synergism, please be patient with me. Saying what I believe is "man centered" is not helpful at all. The question is not "has God decreed?", but "what has God decreed?" Did God give man moral free will as part of His making man in His own image? Is God free to speak into existence a universe in which He places limits on how and when He will give grace? 

Weakness Of The Believer Under The Old Covenant

There is one more aspect of the concept of "Weakness" as it is used in Rom 5:6, where the word Greek word asthenēs is translated "without strength".

Keeping in mind that the context of the book of Romans is the redemptive work of God developed through God's covenantal relationship with Israel. Rom 5:6 says that we were weak and without strength before Christ died for us. One of the reasons they were weak is found in Heb. 7:8 where the Greek word asthenēs is again interpreted "weakness".

Heb 7:18 NKJV  For on the one hand there is an annulling of the former commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness,

Heb 7:18 NASB  For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness

They were weak and without strength because they were under a weak Law. And the Law was weak because "the Law made nothing perfect" Heb 7:19 (NASB). But, we know that the Spirit has been poured out and is making us complete (perfect). John 17:23

They were also weak because the old covenant was an inferior covenant. Heb. 8:6 says the new covenant is better with better promises.

The Greek word for Better is kreittōn which is defined as "stronger". The opposite of "without strength." The Law was "useless" in that it could not minister or supply heavenly benefits like the promises of the new covenant.

The point here is that when Paul says "when we were weak, Christ died for the ungodly." He does not mean we were unable to think or act, being dead like a corpse. Whatever we think might be our condition before salvation, our view of "without strength" must be consistent throughout the bible and throughout out the New Testament's use of the Greek word asthenēs. Being weak does not mean we cannot know, understand or believe the truth. It just means that there are no means by which our knowledge or faith can effect a change in our spiritual condition. To receive we must believe and to believe we need a promise and the promises of the old covenant did not promise adoption or an eternal inheritance; the new covenant did.

When We Were Without Strength

What is the true condition of the sinner? This is a question that has held my interest recently. How you answer this question will determine how you answer many of the other questions that naturally come as we study the bible. Is Mankind totally depraved i.e. unable to understand or respond to truth as the Calvinists say? Of course not. They have introduced the terminology of "Inability" into the discussion, which means the sinner is dead, unresponsive, unable to interact with or comprehend anything spiritual.

Of course both sides of this debate have their supporting scriptures, but I only want to look at one.

• Rom 5:6 KJV  For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.
• Rom 5:6 NASB  For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly

The greek word used here for "without strength" is asthenēs G772.

Strongs defines asthenēs as strengthless (literally or figuratively and morally): - more feeble, impotent, sick, without strength, weak.

It shows up in 23 verses in the New Testament. In the gospels and Acts it mostly refers to being sick and elsewhere it is interpreted as weak or weakness. No where is it used in a context of someone not having the ability to do something. In fact, many of the references talk about believers not sinners. 

Rom 5:6 is the only time the KJV or NASB interpret asthenēs as "without strength" or "helpless". So, asthenēs could very well be interpreted as "we were sick or weak" before Christ died for us. Not that were were cursed to be unable.

A better way, in my opinion, to state the sinner's condition is that they are Unwilling, not unable. A great way to see this is in Matt 26:41 which uses "weak" to interpret asthenēs. But, the verse does something special by giving us the bible's explanation of "weak". And it does this by stating the opposite of "weak".

Mat 26:41 NKJV  Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak."

The big objection is: If man is just unwilling, then maybe a good person might not need the Holy Spirit. I always wonder why people who say this would believe that man is that good. That unless God curses his nature he would be a wonderful person without the spirit of God. This is a misconception. It neglects to realize the depth of man's moral bankruptcy, which is why he is so unwilling to go God's way. The ugliness of the sinner's behavior is not just that he opposes God with a nature that cannot do otherwise, but that he chooses to oppose God and prefers (loves) his own way better. 

Which is more depraved? The dog that kills a cat or The Man that kills the cat out of spite and hate for his neighbor?